by Sunil Sharma

August 15, 2001

However, any company that wants to fundamentally change its industry must first evaluate whether its size and finances can support the aggressive strategic posture that it must adapt to in order to achieve its ambitious objectives. Companies that were successful in changing their industries either had such wherewithal or their industries were ripe for the change. The companies that failed did not have sufficient means to achieve their objectives and hence should not have adopted such strong strategic postures.

Using Internet technologies, companies like Charles Schwab (eSchwab), E*Trade, Amazon.com, Dell and Cisco have been successful in changing their industries or parts of it. Schwab and E*Trade were able to revolutionize the consumer investment industry and Amazon was able to change the book-retailing industry because they were ripe. Dell and Cisco were able to change the supply chain management for their industries because they had control over the downstream value-chain, hence were able to dictate their terms.

This brings us to the second part of the Internet promise. To realize the true potential of the Internet, a majority of businesses are better off by leveraging it to improve their existing business processes and reaching out to new markets rather than trying to revolutionize their industry. They must employ emerging technologies to improve their business processes like customer relationship management, supply chain management, internal and external communications, marketing, operations, etc. Even Dell and Cisco brought significant changes to their industry by using the Internet to improve their business processes.

What this means is that the companies need to deploy emerging technologies creatively to exploit the opportunities presented to them. Mobile telephony is one such emerging technology that is introducing fundamental changes to the ways the business is, and will be, conducted. And, some say that the old cliche about the real estate industry--location, location and location--sums up the true potential of the mobile and wireless technology industry.

Why Consider Mobile Market?

Mobile telephony has grown tremendously in the last few years. So have the data capabilities of the mobile networks and terminals. The industry is also working furiously to improve these capabilities even more. This significantly increases the monetary and strategic potential of mobile networks. Consider the rosy picture that various industry research agencies paint:

• London-based research firm Ovum Ltd. projects the worldwide revenues of the mobile commerce market will total $210.8 billion by 2005.
• Ovum also predicts that global wireless Internet users will number 480 million by 2005.
• McKinsey estimates that in Europe alone the mobile portal market is likely to be worth between $6 billion and $11 billion a year by 2005.
• Strategis Group suggests that by 2006 there will be more than 24 million mobile portal subscribers in the United States, up considerably from the current 2 million in 2001.

The trend toward wireless is becoming clear. It not only opens up the opportunity for mobile communication but also for m-commerce. Mobile technologies present so many opportunities to increase revenue and build competitive advantages that you can ignore them only at your own peril.

M-Commerce: The Next Big Thing

Mobile commerce is a catchall term for conducting business via a mobile telecommunications network. The services that can be accessed over wireless devices fall in several distinct categories. It is projected that by 2003, m-advertising will constitute about 23 percent of m-commerce revenue; investing, banking and payment will constitute 21 percent; and location-based mobile shopping will account for 15 percent.

According to a study by Wirthin Worldwide--a McLean, VA-based strategic research and consulting firm--the top ten wireless Internet activities of 2001 are:

Wirthin also states the percentage of executives who perceived a need for web-enabled devices for different business people:

Mobile Services: Creativity Is the Limit

Effective use of mobile technologies holds out the promise of turning business applications into highly personalized, immediate and location-sensitive services, meeting the ever-increasing demands of business customers and consumers alike.

Mobile banking, investing, investment research, ticketing and e-cash as well as generic electronic purchasing are all areas of huge opportunity. So are the areas of information flow, document management, communications and several not-so-obvious business applications. You can use them to increase your revenue, become more responsive to the market and build competitive advantages.

The simplest form of mobile services are information-based consumer services like sending e-mail, surfing the Web or searching for nearby restaurants or movies over a data-enabled cellular phone or other handheld gadget. Many tout SMS to be the initial killer application for mobile Internet services. SMS is the ability to send and receive text messages to and from mobile devices. According to Durlacher Research, by October 1999, 2 billion SMS messages were sent monthly, double than what was sent six months prior. This rate is going to continue for some time.

Financial services also present big opportunities. Celent Communications predicts that 150 million people will use global wireless financial services by 2004, compared to 10 million in 2000. ARC Group forecasts that wireless-banking users will grow to 331 million by 2004.

Location-Based Services Are Critical

A key factor influencing the utility of mobile devices is their ability to allow people to stay connected with their office, customers, market and others all the time. Unlike wire-line users, wireless users could be anywhere. So determining the location of wireless users becomes critical for increasing the usefulness of wireless applications.

Location-based services (LBS) allow mobile users to receive services relative to their geographic location. They blend information about a person's location with other useful content, providing relevant, timely and local information to consumers when and where they need it. For example, those trying to hail a cab in New York City can simply type "taxi" on their cell phone, sending a signal to a local cab company that can then dispatch a driver closest to that location. Similarly, a salesperson can get information about customers and local business events around the area where he or she is.

Through LBS, JB Hunt Transport Services, Inc. was able to improve its capacity management with real-time visualization of freight-hauling operations resulting in faster and more accurate customer pickup and a reduction in rescheduled or late pickups. Granite Systems, Inc. in Manchester, NH deployed LBS for real-time geographic and circuit layout visualization of complex telecommunications networks for rapid analysis of network problems. United Behavioral Health used LBS for its call center operators to instantly identify the most conveniently located provider with the qualifications meeting each member's particular needs.

Wireless and mobile technologies are truly the next frontiers of the Internet and Web. They enable users to always be connected to the world, their business and others. The m-commerce value chain also consists of a number of players including technology platform vendors, infrastructure vendors, application platform vendors, application developers, content providers, content aggregators, mobile portal providers, network operators, mobile service providers and handset vendors. This means that the immense opportunities of mobile technologies are available to different types of businesses, including yours. If you do not think creatively and make use of them, you may miss reaching--at the risk of sounding melodramatic--El Dorado.

Strategic and results-oriented, Sunil has more than 15 years of experience in management and IT consulting. An entrepreneurial consultant, he has founded a business-to-business eCommerce company and has provided consulting services to large and small firms in the UK, Far East, India, Europe and the United States. His area of expertise includes strategic management, strategic marketing and business planning for high-tech firms. An avid mountain climber and runner, Sunil has climbed Mt. Kilimanjaro and various peaks in the Himalayas and finished the Detroit marathon. He holds an MBA degree from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, and a BS in Electronics and an MS in Mathematics from the Birla Institute of Technology and Sciences in Pilani, India. Voice: (703)-312-4469; Email: sunilsharma@cerebralworks.com.